As House members returned today to hear a flurry of amendments on the Voter ID bill, Democrats’ hands were tied.

With a procedural maneuver, Democrats temporarily stalled House Republicans’ effort on Monday to vote on a bill that would require Texans to show a government-issued photo ID before voting.

But early today, Speaker Joe Straus, R-San Antonio, overruled six points of order by Democrats. Instead, the minority party united behind an agenda to revive memories of state-sanctioned racial discrimination prior to federal voting protections. They called the Voter ID measure a GOP-backed political scheme to hamper the voting rights of the elderly, Hispanic and African American populations.

“It’s changing it to make it more difficult for people who look like me to have the ability to go and vote,” said Rep. Dawnna Dukes, D-Austin, in a lengthy rebuttal that garnered scattered applause in the House gallery. “This [is the] same concept of disenfranchising. Don’t take away the right that my people have had to vote.”

As the afternoon drudged on, Democrats continued to engage Republicans in at times awkward, rambling and often rhetorical exchanges about landmark federal civil rights laws. But Republicans largely skirted addressing minority voting rights, often saying those issues were not germane to the Voter ID bill before the chamber.

Rep. Patricia Harless, R-Spring, the bill’s sponsor, fielded many of the Democrats’ most pointed questions, including whether Harless recognized that the bill would affect minorities. Her response: the bill would affect “all Texans.”

“Do you believe the Voting Rights Act is a good law?” asked Rep. Richard Raymond, D-Laredo, to Harless. “Do you believe the Voting Rights Act is necessary?”

“That is a federal issue to be decided by the federal courts,” Harless retorted.